GITMO-ization of Washington: Rory Kennedy's film

"Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority."

Sound bites followed from the young men and women who had been accused of the worst kind of torture at Abu Ghraib:

"That place turned me into a monster."

"You become like a robot."

"If you walk through all of that, when do you say 'It's enough'?"

"You'll go crazy if you don't adapt to it."

"After 9-11, I believed someone had to pay."

For years, the United States was not only a follower of the Geneva Conventions; we were known to promote and operate above those standards.

John Yoo, however, thought it was time to move on. "They don't apply", he said of the Conventions.

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Sam Provance, another MP, said that Abu Ghraib was like Apocalyse Now meeting The Shining. "There are ghosts there," he said. Building 1B had women and children in it--they were there to draw in the more dangerous insurgents. But in the end, it was clear to the MPs that at least 75-80% of those held had no information or intelligence to give over.

General Geoffrey Miller was dispatched from Guantanamo, where they had developed the use of dogs for torture, among other methods, to Iraq. According to Donald Rumsfield, they just weren't getting the intel from Abu Ghraib. He sent Miller to "GITMO-ize" Abu Ghraib.

Rumsfield also added a note to one of his dispatches, pointing out that HE--Rumsfield--often had to stand up for 8-12 hours a day and why were the prisoners at Abu Graib only standing up for four hours a day?

General Miller had some advice for Brig. Gen. Karpinski: "If you don't treat the prisoners like dogs, you are treating them too well."

General Sanchez, who was the top commander in Iraq, issued conflicting and confusing recommendations on what was OK and what was not. The military police and guards were totally unclear on what they could and could not do.

Nakedness, for example. One of the guards stated "It was just business." The interrogation efforts were removed from Brig. General Karpinski, and the interrogators were given free rein. It became customary (and recommended) to torture the detainees throughout the night before they were going to be interrogated. And tortured they were.

But the night shift had cameras. Sabrina, one of the guards (the one with the big smile in the photos) said she liked to take pictures, always had. Another said that he wanted souvenir photos of the places they'd been.

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The interviews with the prisoners themselves is wrenching. A psychiatrist pointed out that it's harder to cure psychological torture than it is to cure physical torture. One man describes holding his father in his arms while he died. Others describe what it was like to hear their fellow prisoners being tortured.

"We listened as his soul cracked."

The description and photos of the three men, naked, who were forced to take sexual positions with each other, while the soldiers stood around looking on were the hardest to watch. The sheer degradation of everyone, including the soldiers, is stunningly clear. This is what we have come to; this is who we are in the world now.

Eleven soldiers have been convicted of the torture. Gen. Miller got a promotion and some more ribbons for his chest. Donald Rumsfield got fired, but only after three more years of damage. George Bush got re-elected. Janice Karpinski got demoted and fired. We the people got nothing, except the contempt of the world, and we can only hope, enough guilt to move us to act....http://tinyurl.com/2qhwk7 [Open in new window]

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If you still support the Bush administration at this time, please kill yourself...

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